As part of their ‘Good Digital Identity Futures‘ project, the researchers created a one-month, online residency for three artists to explore the theme of: Digital Identities Over Time.
About the residency
Three international artists were recruited to take part in a one-month online residency exploring the theme Digital Identities Over Time. This took place on an online platform called gather.town, an immersive and experimental 8-bit digital environment. In this space the artists could meet and discuss ideas with the researchers and each other. Throughout the residency we ran a series of events that showcased the artists’ work you can see an example of this here. This culminated in an online exhibition in the same gather.town space. This exhibition showcases artists’ responses to this theme and their relation to ‘good’ digital identity futures.
The aim with the residency was to provide different perspectives and provoke debate about what future digital identities might be like, how they might unfold over time, and what we want from such digital identity systems – particularly given the emerging technologies in this field such as: self-sovereign identity systems, biometrics, facial recognition, identity cards, social media, AI, etc.
Who are the residents?
Online Exhibition
On June 13th 2024 we launched our online exhibition, showcasing the artists’ work from this residency. This is now open for everyone to explore, the image here is the landing page for the artist residency. Click the image or here and explore the space!
Navigation tips:
- Enter exhibition – through the cd icon near the top of the Windows 95 interface
- Moving around – use the arrow keys or w,s,a,d on your keyboard
- Shortcuts – if you want to jump to the artists’ work, go through the shortcut icon by their name on the Windows 95 interface
- Interactivity – when exploring the exhibition if you walk up to an object and you see a yellow outline around it – this means you can interact with it in some way! To do this you just press ‘x’ on the keyboard and it will open – and you can then close this to return.
- Whiteboards – in the spaces you’ll see whiteboards, if you want to leave your opinions on the metaphors please press ‘x’ and two short questions will appear for you to fill in!
The following sections will outline each stage of this exhibition, detailing the artist’s work and our reflections on the residency overall.
Metaphor Spaces
In between each of the artist rooms are 2 ‘metaphor spaces’. In the video above we walk through each of these metaphor spaces and provide an overview of the ideas embedded within the metaphors presented. Within the context of the exhibition, these spaces demonstrate vague links between the artist’s works to the overall theme of Digital Identities Over Time.
Metaphors applied to digital identities are currently limited to this idea of a digitised form of an identification document e.g. a passport. This bypasses the actual reality of living with these technologies and does not encapsulate the societal implications when considering ‘good’ digital identity futures. Therefore, the metaphor spaces each explore a separate, or alternative metaphor provoking further debate about ‘good’ digital identity futures. Please note, they are not intended to provide answers but are instead to further question ideas around this topic. These metaphors have derived from insights across our ‘good’ digital identity futures project including insights from this residency.
Anshul Roy’s Exhibition Performance
The video above is Anshul’s performance art piece which was performed during the exhibition launch of this residency. There is a content warning for this performance with potentially distressing images from the archives discussed.
Anshul is a visual artist from India, currently based in New York. His artistic practice is inspired by postcolonial discourses, exploring issues like cultural representation, identity, historical memory & visual ethics. He has exhibited his work in several places including the iidrr Gallery, Art Gallery of Peterborough, Light Work and the Manifest Gallery.
For more information about Anshul and his work throughout the residency, please visit his residency profile.
Jeanne Jo’s Film
Link to the final film or click on the image of the exhibition space to watch!
The film above is the final output of Jeanne’s work from this residency. If you visit the exhibition space there are additional videos which support the main film.
Jeanne is an American visual artist and film maker currently based in LA. She is interested in investigating power dynamics, interpersonal relationships and physical and emotional vulnerability through the creation of single-channel and multi-channel narrative films, large-scale video installations & durational performance. She has had her work widely exhibited at the Slamdance Film Festival and the Southern Utah Museum of Art and has won the audience award at the Scream Queens Film Festival Tokyo.
For more information about Jeanne and her work throughout the residency, please visit her residency profile.
Mac Andre Arboleda’s Exhibition Performance
Mac’s exhibition space can be seen in the online gather.town space here.
Mac is an artist from the Philippines currently based in London who is interested in exploring the sickness of the internet through research and dialogue, art and text, organising and publishing. He is the Founding President of the UP Internet Freedom Network and Co-founder of the Artists for Digital Rights Network as well as exhibiting in Nomina Nuda, Akademie Schloss Solitude and Ars Electronica.
For more information about Mac and his work throughout the residency, please visit his residency profile.
Roundtable
The roundtable event took place at the end of the online exhibition launch. The purpose of this roundtable was to reflect on the works in the exhibition in relation to the theme Digital Identities Over Time. This was discussed through the lens of past, present and future digital identities.
In addition to our fantastic artists-in-residents, this roundtable featured three special guest panellists
Jen Southern is a Senior Lecturer at Lancaster University. She is an artist, lecturer in Fine Art and New Media, and an Associate Director at the Centre for Mobilities Research at Lancaster University. Her work is a hybrid of art practice and mobilities research and has been exhibited internationally for over 25 years.
Lisa Thomas is an Assistant Professor at Northumbria University. She is an associate director of the psychology and communication technology research group, chair of the psychology’s department Athena swan team and fellow of the HEA. She has been a senior researcher for three successive multidisciplinary EPSRC projects: IMPRINTS, ReelLIVES and DERC that all have some connection to digital identities.
Linda Spurdle is formerly Head of Digital at Birmingham Museums Trust where she led digital strategy, digital engagement and ICT across Birmingham Museums Trust. She has spearheaded Birmingham’s open access policy which has made thousands of out of copyright images free to use without restrictions.
Reflections from residents
Following the residency, a couple of our residents reflected on their time in the residency and shared their thoughts with us through some Q&A blogposts. You can find out more from both Anshul and Mac.
Residency Hosts
Dr Kim Snooks
Postdoctoral Researcher, Digital Good Network; Senior Research Associate, Design for Digital Good
Dr Kim Snooks is a postdoctoral researcher in Design for Digital Good as part of the Digital Good Network. She works with Dr Dan Richards on research around ‘good’ future digital identities, drawing on concepts of the self and identity from personal informatics and social media research.
She studied for her PhD in Design at ImaginationL ancaster, Lancaster University, where she used speculative methods to critically examine future health-tracking technologies. Drawing on more-than human theory, she explored how different perspectives of contextualised personal informatics data might be included in system design.
Dr Dan Richards
Digital Good Network Technology Translations Lead; Lecturer in Data Prototyping and Visualisation, Lancaster University
Dr Dan Richards is Lecturer in Data Prototyping and Visualisation at Lancaster University. His current research focuses on combining speculative design, unconventional computing and data visualisation to explore futures of emerging technologies.
He has been Co-I and Design lead on two EPSRC-funded projects that explored “Data-Driven Design”: “Qualified Selves: Co-Creating Meaning Post-Big Data” (2019-20), “Chatty Factories” (2018-21), and was co-organiser of the Digital Economy Network funded “Data Publics” conference (2016). His interdisciplinary research has been presented at various top design and scientific venues, whilst his creative works have been exhibited at art exhibitions and tradeshows across the UK, China and the US.
As Technology Translations Lead for the Digital Good Network, Dan is responsible for technology translation, overseeing our design and development sprints, and coordinating the provocative prototyping (or “provotyping”) activity of the network.